


Private Little Bubble

by Seraph_Novak



Series: Tyrus One-Shots [22]
Category: Andi Mack (TV)
Genre: Acceptance, Boyfriends, Coming Out, Cute, Family Feels, Love Confessions, M/M, One Shot, Secret Relationship, Tyrus - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-08
Updated: 2018-10-08
Packaged: 2019-07-28 03:23:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16233209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Seraph_Novak/pseuds/Seraph_Novak
Summary: Fic request ~ TJ invites Cyrus to a family party. But when his Aunt starts talking to Cyrus about girls, TJ has to step in and explain the situation.





	Private Little Bubble

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, guys! I won't be able to watch the new episode until tomorrow, so I'm occupying myself by writing instead... I hope you enjoy!
> 
> As always, all comments and kudos are very much appreciated ♥
> 
> [My Tumblr](https://seraph-novak.tumblr.com)

TJ kept a keen eye on the window beside the front door, eagerly awaiting his boyfriend’s arrival as his family gathered in the dining hall behind him. As soon as he spotted Cyrus walking down the street – looking absolutely gorgeous in a dark green suit – he threw open the door and met him halfway up the stairs, dragging him into a hug on the middle of the porch. Cyrus was a little stiff with surprise, but TJ could feel him smiling against his cheek.

“This is nice,” Cyrus said, “but your family is right through that door, remember?”

TJ gave him a quick kiss before pulling away. He glanced over his shoulder to make sure no one had spotted them, then closed the front door with a flick of his foot. “That better?”

Cyrus huffed, his eyes sparkling. “You’re the one who didn’t want to come out to your family straight away,” he reminded him. “You wanted to enjoy our private little bubble for as long as possible, remember?”

“I know, I know…” TJ let his forehead fall softly against Cyrus’. “But all our friends know. Amber knows. Your parents know… I think maybe it’s time.”

“You sure?”

TJ grabbed his hands and lifted them to his lips, kissing each individual knuckle in the way that always made Cyrus giggle. “I love our private little bubble,” he admitted with a shrug, “but I’m ready for more now. I wanna do this in public, you know? I wanna be able to invite my boyfriend over for sleepovers, and kiss him in the street without looking over my shoulder first. You get what I’m saying?”

Cyrus nodded, the corners of his mouth quirking ever so slightly with an understanding smile. “You want to come out.”

TJ blew out a breath. “Yeah, I do.”

“Tonight?”

“Well, there’s no time like the present.”

Cyrus wriggled his hands free of TJ’s grasp and placed them on his shoulders instead. “Are you absolutely positive you wanna do this?”

TJ bit the inside of his cheek, silently contemplating the pros and cons of coming out to his entire family in one night. “I know my parents will be fine with it,” he said, “and Amber already knows, so…”

“What about the rest of your family?” Cyrus asked. “I thought you said they were super religious?”

Memories of Sunday school and church camp flitted through his mind, catapulting him back to a time of itchy suits and pocket bibles. His immediate family had gravitated from religion a few years ago, but most of his relatives were still devote Christians. How would they react to having a gay teenager amongst them? He wasn’t even sure what Christians generally believed about homosexuality anymore. Times were changing, but had they really progressed that much? He wanted to come out to them more than anything, but he wasn’t sure he was ready to get shunned by almost everyone in his family just yet…

“Stop panicking,” Cyrus told him, giving his shoulders a gentle squeeze to calm him down. “You don’t have to do this tonight, okay? It’s completely up to you, TJ. Whenever you’re ready.”

TJ felt his muscles melting with relief. “Maybe I got a little ahead of myself.”

“It’s okay.”

“You’re not mad?”

Cyrus wrinkled his nose. “Why would I be mad?”

“Because I feel like I’m hiding you away or something.” He tilted his head to kiss the back of Cyrus’ hand, still resting on his shoulder as a gesture of support. “But that’s the last thing I wanna do. You know that, right?”

“Of course I do.” Cyrus flashed him an adorable half-smile. “You need time. That’s completely understandable.”

“But you came out to your parents as soon as we started dating.”

“This isn’t a race, TJ.”

“Yeah, but –”

“We all have our own personal struggles,” Cyrus interjected softly. “Just because I’m your boyfriend, doesn’t give me the right to pressure you into coming out before you’re ready. The ball is completely in your court.”

TJ chuckled. “Are you trying to use basketball metaphors again?”

“Did it work?”

“Well, considering that’s a _tennis_ reference, not really.”

“Oh…”

TJ grinned. “You’re such a dork,” he said, fisting his hands in his boyfriend’s sleeves and leaning forward for another kiss. “You don’t need to keep using sports terminology to try and impress me, okay?”

“But I’m getting better!”

“Yeah… Not really.”

“Don’t be mean.” Cyrus gave him a playful punch in the shoulder, and TJ laughed. “Should we go inside?”

TJ angled his ear towards the door. He could hear the muffled chatter of his family dotted around the house, and the distant clink of cutlery being carried into the dining hall. In a few minutes, dinner would begin.

“Yeah, probably.”

Cyrus smoothed his frown with the pad of his thumb. “Are you okay?”

“I’m good.” TJ kissed his thumb and smiled. “Let’s go.”

The introductions were a lot less painful than TJ had anticipated – probably because Cyrus was such an instant hit with everyone. His boyfriend had already told him what a natural catch he was with older people, but TJ hadn’t expected his relatives to love him _this_ much. They were practically flocking to him, fighting over the chance to pinch his cheeks and compliment his outfit. Cyrus, of course, was preening under the attention, and TJ couldn’t help but watch him with a no doubt dreamy expression on his face the entire time. He only had the good sense to tone his heart eyes down when Amber shot him a warning look across the room.

At dinner, he and Cyrus sat near the end of the long table, where his mom’s brothers and sisters were sat. There were five of them in total – his mom had come from a pretty big family – but it was his Aunt Amelia that TJ was mainly worried about. Of all his relatives, she was arguably the most passionate about her faith, and the idea of Cyrus being sat next to her for the whole night made him nervous.

“So,” Aunt Amelia said, neatly folding her hands in front of her as she turned to face Cyrus, “how do you know TJ then?”

Cyrus took a generous gulp of sparkling water before answering the question, clearly trying to stall while he came up with an appropriate lie. “Oh, well… We go to the same school.” Aunt Amelia gave him an encouraging smile, urging him to go on, so Cyrus added, “He used to play basketball with my best friend, but she’s starting her own girls’ team now.”

“Isn’t that nice. What’s her name?”

“Buffy.”

“Is she pretty?”

Cyrus faltered slightly. “Um… Yes. I mean, definitely!”

“Is she your girlfriend?”

TJ leaned across Cyrus to shoot his Aunt a glare. “Leave him alone, Aunt Amelia! Not all teenage boys have girlfriends, you know?”

“I’m just asking a simple question,” she said, waving her hand dismissively. She softened her smile and squeezed Cyrus’ arm. “A handsome young man like this deserves a pretty girl.”

“Actually, I –”

“My nephew hasn’t been rubbing off on you, has he? Every time I ask him about his love life, he gets terribly defensive.”

“Because it’s invasive!” TJ cried.

“Oh, hush. Let Cyrus answer the question.”

“He doesn’t want to.”

Aunt Amelia rolled her eyes. “Just because _you’re_ determined to stay single, doesn’t mean your friend wants to be lonely too.”

TJ gritted his teeth and stabbed his plate with a fork. Cyrus looked extremely uncomfortable as Aunt Amelia continued to ramble on about girls and dating and young love, and TJ couldn’t stand to sit back and watch his boyfriend suffer. The only way to save him was to divert the attention to himself, and the only way he could think to do that was to make a dramatic announcement.

“I _am_ dating someone,” he said, a little louder than necessary.

Aunt Amelia halted mid-sentence, all eyes at the table suddenly swivelling to him. He cast a helpless glance around the room, searching for some kind of out from the difficult situation he’d thrown himself into, but there was no escaping it now. His family wanted answers. He found Cyrus’ hand under the table and held onto it for dear life, trying to seek some kind of comfort amongst the sea of curious eyes surrounding him. When Cyrus squeezed his hand in return, he looked at his boyfriend and felt his heart skip a beat. The love and understanding radiating from Cyrus’ smile was undeniable, and it made TJ realise how badly he wanted everyone in this room to know the truth – that he had the most amazing and beautiful boyfriend in the entire world, and that he was tired of hiding it.

“I’m dating someone,” he repeated himself. “Someone in this room.”

A few whispers were scattered across the table, but no one seemed to connect the dots straight away.

“I have a boyfriend,” he admitted, his voice cracking slightly as he draped a shaking arm around Cyrus’ shoulders. There was a gasp from somewhere in the room, but TJ ploughed on. “I’ve been dating Cyrus for almost a month. We’re boyfriends.” He swallowed thickly and shrugged. “I’m gay.”

Apart from the sound of Cyrus sniffing softly – his eyes glistening with tears of pride – the room was utterly silent. TJ held his breath as he waited for all hell to break loose, but no one said a word. He half expected a tumbleweed to blow through. If someone didn’t say something soon, it was going to get seriously awkward, and TJ wasn’t sure he could handle it. He was _this_ close to leaving the room when Aunt Amelia finally broke the silence.

“Do you love him?” she asked.

TJ was taken aback by the question. “Um… What –”

“ _Do you love him_?”

Despite the pounding of his heart and the fear swirling in his gut, an instinctive smile found its way to his lips. He turned to Cyrus and nodded, his throat rippling. “I do,” he said, only slightly surprised by how easy it was to say those words out loud.

Aunt Amelia gave Cyrus a nudge and asked him the very same question: “Do you love him?”

Cyrus wiped his eyes with the back of his sleeve, his lips trembling with a watery smile, and mirrored TJ’s nod. “I do.”

For a moment, they were lost in each other’s unwavering gaze, and everyone else in the room faded into nothingness. Cyrus ducked his head bashfully, then glanced up at TJ beneath his dark lashes. He looked unfairly adorable. If pretty much every member of his close family wasn’t in the room with them, he probably would’ve tilted his chin upwards and sealed his lips with the gentlest of kisses, trailing his fingers over Cyrus’ soft, boyish skin, and savouring every second of their closeness. But instead, he basked in the warm glow of Cyrus’ love-drenched smile and committed every detail of this moment to memory, like collecting sunshine for a rainy day.

“Well,” Aunt Amelia said, lifting her shoulders nonchalantly, “that’s the important thing, isn’t it?”

The murmur of agreement around the table quickly erupted into full-on cheers of praise and support. TJ was completely dumbstruck by the positive response. He hadn’t expected pitch forks and exorcisms, but he’d at least been prepared for a few lectures, and maybe even a couple of patronising comments about his sexuality being a ‘phase’, or how boys his age weren’t mature enough to understand themselves yet. He scanned his eyes across the table, searching for a single frown of disapproval, but there was none to be found. His parents were smiling knowingly at him, as if they’d had their suspicions all along, and Amber was giving him one of her signature sister smirks – not quite kind, but affectionate in a way that only siblings were capable of understanding. Even his 87-year-old great grandma – whose birthday they were all here to celebrate – was regarding him with nothing but warmth and pride. It was a little disconcerting, to say the least.

Once everyone had returned to their dinner, and the conversation in the room had drifted from the topic of TJ’s coming out, he turned to Cyrus and said, “Did that really just happen?”

“It did.” Cyrus rested his head on TJ’s shoulder. “I’m so proud of you, Teej.”

“I… I don’t even know what to do now.” He scratched the back of his head and huffed a laugh. “I was so ready for a fight, you know? I feel weird.”

Cyrus kissed his shoulder. “I know what you can do.” He lifted his hand from under the table and placed it between them, his open palm visible for everyone to see. TJ stared at the inviting spread of his fingers and bit his lip. When he flicked his eyes back up to Cyrus, his boyfriend was smiling that soft, heart-stuttering smile of his again. “It’s time to burst the bubble.”

TJ glanced around the room once more, his body still stiff with the certainty that this was all some kind of sick joke, and that his family was going to turn on him at any second. But as he took in the sight around him – his great grandma trying to take a sip of champagne without losing her teeth; his sister playing the drums with her knife and fork in an effort to make their younger cousins laugh; his parents leaning against each other at the head of the table; his Aunt Amelia ranting to her brothers about the increased cost of parking at her local supermarket; his dad patiently explaining the plot of the book he was reading to his partly-deaf grandfather – he realised there was nothing to worry about. No one in this room cared if he was gay or not. They loved each other fiercely, and that was all that mattered.

“I think you’re right,” he said, returning Cyrus’ smile with a dopey grin of his own. “Time to burst the bubble.”

He took his boyfriend’s hand, and he held it.


End file.
